08 August 2011

Replacement for Disinfecting Wipes

Have you ever actually read the directions on these things!? I bought a store brand disinfecting wipe but I doubt the directions are much different than the clorox ones. Were you aware that to properly disinfect according to the directions that you had to use "enough" wipes to keep the surface your cleaning wet for 10 minutes? TEN MINUTES!? Using these things they'd dry within a couple of minutes. So, does that mean that they are not properly cleaning my counter-tops? Also it says once you use them on food surfaces that you have to then go back over the area with water. Wow, I did not know... maybe I'm dumb but when I bought these things I thought it was a no brainer situation and that the directions would be as followed... take out wipe, clean surface, let dry, throw away. Geez. On top of the fact that these things never last long in the house they are expensive and dangerous to children and animals according to the packaging. When I clean my little one likes to with me. Granted I've never handed her a wipe but she will usually follow behind me with a wet paper towel playing clean-up. After putting a lot of research into how to replace these I've found that you need to use bleach. Not very child friendly but at least you know what the ingredients in these are! I've found several clever ways to make these and now that my container is empty I'm ready to go! First off, you can use socks, cut up fabric or t-shirt material to keep things reusable but you can also use paper towels. On an earlier post I said I was going to use my old socks but I think the easiest way to go with this would be to experiment with it first using paper towels and then use t-shirt material because it would be much easier to keep using my socks as "gloves" to dip in the solution in the bottle and clean with rather than fully submerge them. If you choose to use the socks by submerging them in the cleaner your hands will probably dry out. I really like wearing mine on my hands because I can really get into things like corners and grout lines with my fingers that way. Anyway, enough babbling here is the recipe:

DISINFECTING WIPES:

2 and a 1/2 cups of water
1/4 cup bleach
a roll of paper towels

Place the 2 and a 1/2 cups water on the stove to boil.

In the mean time take your roll of paper towels preferably the heavy duty kind. Cut the roll in half with a serated knife or if you have one an electric knife.
Once your water has reached a boil pour 1/4 cup of bleach into the water and turn off the stove.
Put the paper towels into the container you are using (I used my old wipe container) and place the container into the sink. Slowly and carefully pour the boiling water/bleach mixture over the paper towels.


Once the mixture has been poured in carefully remove the middle cardboard. It should come out easily.
Once done you can put your lid on and you them whenever you feel ready to. I left my container in the sink until it cooled off just in case the plastic might melt. The container held up and did not melt! :)
FINAL REVIEW: I used them right away and they cleaned up the mess I had made in the kitchen very well. The only thing I did not like about these was the strong bleach smell. Maybe once the canister cools down and sits for a bit the smell will calm down too. Overall they seem to clean great.

FINAL COST BREAKDOWN:
One pack of blue shop /car towels (I used these because they are very heavy duty): 4.99. I used half so lets say 2.50. I am sure to save more money you can use any other heavy duty paper towels but I had these around the house and my other paper towels were thinner.
One gallon container of bleach: 1.00. 1/4 cup of the bleach: 0.17 cents
Total: 2.67
The last canister of wipes that I bought cost 3.48 and contained 75 wipes. So, total savings for this is 0.81 cents. Over time if you continue to use these or use cheaper paper towels I'm sure your savings will be more!


*** UPDATE FOR THE FINAL REVIEW*** Once I let the wipes cool off the over powering bleach smell went away, it was still there a bit but it was a normal smell now. I used one of the wipes to clean up my stove after dinner  (splattered vegetable oil) and it cleaned it up no problem. They work great!!!

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